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Grigorii G. Kosach
. In the name of the national interests:
Foreign policy of Saudi Arabia…
region and in the world. Before 2011, Saudi Arabia — the land of the ‘Two Holy
Mosques’ — positioned itself as a representative of the
international Muslim
community and in pursuing its foreign policy relied primarily on the religious
authority and fi nancial capabilities. However, according to Saudi Arabia’s
leaders, the Arab Spring has plunged the region into chaos and has bolstered
the infl uence of various extremist groups and movements, which required a
signifi cant adjustment of traditional political approaches. Saudi Arabia, more
explicit than ever before, has declared itself as a nation state, as a regional leader
possessing its own interests beyond the abstract ‘Muslim Ummah’. However,
the author stresses that these new political ambitions
do not imply a complete
break with the previous practice. For example, the containment of Iran not only
remains the cornerstone of Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy, but has become even
more severe. The paper shows that it is this opposition to Iran, which is now
justifi ed on the basis of protecting the national interests, that predetermines the
nature and the specifi c content of contemporary Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy
including interaction with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), approaches
towards the solution of the Israeli-Palestinian confl ict, combating terrorism,
and relations with the United States. In that regard, the transformation of Saudi
Arabia’s foreign policy has, on the one hand, opened up new opportunities for
strengthening the Kingdom’s
interaction with Israel, but, at the same time, has
increased tensions within the framework of strategic partnership with the United
States. The author concludes that currently Saudi Arabia is facing a challenge of
diversifying its foreign policy in order to increase its international profi le and
political subjectivity.
Keywords:
Saudi Arabia, Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud,
Mohammad bin
Salman Al Saud, Saudi foreign policy, the Arab Spring, Gulf Cooperation Coun-
cil, Iran, Israel,
international terrorism, the United States.
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